You don't have to visit the onion network. You can use TOR because you want to remain anonymous. However, TOR does have some weaknesses. I've read that the <video> element introduced in HTML5 is vulnerable to leaking your real IP. There could be more but if the NSA finds them, they aren't going to tell anyone.

Exit nodes are vulnerable, traffic not crypted, so NSA and other snoopers can easily track the traffic and activities through them. Some people says that about one third of all exit nodes are owned by NSA and similar agencies.

And javascript can leak your IP, also downloading any image or document... all in all, it is not safe like many people think.

Far as "commercial browsing" goes, TOR is safe. Only country-level spies can crack it, but for 99.99% of sites you'll be perfectly anonymous.

Also, someone mentioned criminals getting caught : the purpose of Tor is not to cover up crimes, but to give average folks a relatively anonymous platform. The criminals getting caught on the Onion network are doing drugs, murder, and so on, and most likely they were caught outside of Tor, via their money trail, rather than on Tor.

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